Street Fighter V  the legendary fighting franchise returns exclusively on the PC and PS4. How does it hold up to past entries in the series? This entry felt more accessible than past entries and the gameplay is superb. The bad thing is that casual fans of the series that are not into the competitive online nature will find single-player content to be heavily lite. It will have free updates in the coming months to add more value to the game for free. It is a one time buy, no more Super/Ultra editions, but the content on launch is lacking. At launch the online servers were malfunctioning but as of now the servers are more stable and easy to find a match with no lag. Street Fighter V is identical to both platforms. Read on to find out how the latest entry holds up.

Story

There are 16 characters to choose from launch. The Story mode currently available is quite short and the story is ok not great. Each character you play has only three battles and dialogue with static images between the story battles with an ending scenario. At times  character’s story may face the same opponent for two matches which is does not provide much variety. This is only a prologue story to understand the characters a bit until the upcoming cinematic story mode that releases in the summer for free. After completing each character’s story prologue it rewards one time Character XP, Player Level XP, titles and Fight money currency use to buy upcoming content without real cash.

Gameplay

Gameplay in this entry is more accessible for newcomers to easily  familiarize than past entries. EX move now renamed Critical-Assault is more straight forward to use for all characters for their flashy special move. Critical-Gauge fills up as you take damage from the opponent. The last entry had the focus trigger moves and now the V-System takes the spot. It has two modes to use, one is the V-Reversal and the second the V-Trigger mode. It is available for all characters but each have their own unique version for example boost damage, speed, and other utilizations.

The V-Reversal  uses one gauge to utilize to counter an attack while guarding. Activating the V-Trigger is done once the meter is fully charge by pressing the R1 & R2 triggers on the PS4 and stays active for a time to utilize your character’s other special moves. In order to fill up the V-Gauge you must land your V-Skill against your opponent or taking hits from your opponent. This V-Gauge does not carry over to the next round unlike the Critical-Gauge. Use it at the right time once its charge. All this is done using the same single button command R1 on PS4. After familiarization of the V-System it adds more depth to the gameplay and helps you out in tough spots. This provides great gameplay moments and found it more easy to do flashy combo chains.

Single-Player Modes

The single player modes currently available is very lite. Story mode, Survival Mode, Training mode and Versus mode. Story mode like i said above is short. Training mode is great to practice and improve skills. Versus mode is only vs another local human player. There is no versus AI available which is strange if you want to have a quick one on one match with any opponent of your choosing and difficulty.

Survival Mode has Easy, Normal, Hard, and Hell sections. Starting from Easy is only 10 matches, then 30, 50 and on Hell 100 matches. Each section increases the number of matches to survive in order to complete it. Each match success adds score points that may be use to boost a stat to have higher chance of completing the section selected in Survival Mode. Use the points wisely as the fights get difficult later on and if use poorly expect to lose the round. The balance goes crazy in the last matches. Right now this is the only way to get more color skins for their default costume which is annoying to earn at times when your close of beating the section and you lose in the last match requiring to restart all over again. It is frustrating when you lose all that time and  gain nothing in return. Complete each section only once to earn something and after that there is nothing more to gain but gaining a higher score. All characters that complete each section once rewards Character XP, Player Level XP, titles, more color skins and Fight money once only.

There is no Challenge Mode at launch or a Shop. These two modes will be release next month in March. Once the Shop is release it will be revealed how much Fight Money stuff cost. Right now to earn Fight money is by playing the Story for each character, completing each Character’s Survival Mode sections and Online Fights only. Hopefully it is reasonable to attain future content, only time will time once it is revealed the Fight Money prices.

Online Modes

At launch the servers were terrible but at this moment they are now more stable. If this did not get fix quick the game would be very lite of no content. Compete in Ranked matches or Casual matches online. Then lastly there is a Battle Lounge mode where you add friends for custom battle matches. Entering into in online battle there is no character selection screen. In the fighter profile select your favorite character and that becomes your online character to use. If you wanna change characters you must edit your fighter profile before searching for an online battle. In the Battle Lounge mode it allows to activate the character selection screen. In online fights it allows cross-play between  PC and PS4 players in matches as well which is awesome.

Final Impressions

Overall it provide an enjoyable time with the gameplay in Street Fighter V but the lack of content on launch is very saddening. Hardcore fans or competitive fighters would picked it up right away. The casual single-player fighter fan should wait until more single-player content gets added unless you have the patience to wait for content incoming it is a must buy to start gathering Fight Money. I wished Capcom would have waited more time in development to launch with the standard robust modes that all fighter genre games have. If Capcom keeps its promise of releasing more content for free in the coming months and years this is will be the best Street Fighter game released with this one time purchase model, but at the moment it is heavy lite on single-player content that feels like an Early-Access game. 

The gameplay is highly accessible and  a blast to play with the new V-Trigger system. Great old cast and newcomer fighters each unique. There are 11 stages to fight on launch. Lastly the visuals are cool but a bit cartoony looking. Questions or thoughts on the game let me know in the comments below. Placing a comment will enter you for a chance to win one U.S. PSN digital code for the game. Contest ends on Friday March 11th and winner announced after.

Rating

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Screenshots

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Fact Sheet

Developer: Capcom  Publisher: Capcom

ESRB Rating:

  Rated T for Teen

Released On: Feb 16, 2016      Platform: PC, PS4

Players: 1-2             Price: $59.99

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